Sotheby's Fine Books and Manuscripts estimated it to take less but a bidder by phone went all the way.

Bruce Springsteen's handwritten draft of "Born to Run" is worth more than expected. The piece of paper, written in 1974 with the rocker's cursive hand in blue ink, fetched $197,000 at a New York auction. The number is double the estimated $70,000 to $100,000.

"This was done in 1974 when he was going through preparing for his third album," Richard Austin, head of Sotheby's Fine Books and Manuscripts, told Reuters before the sale. "And there is a story he tells about sitting on the edge of his bed with his guitar and the phrase 'born to run' comes into his head. And what you are actually looking at is the process he goes through to get to the finished song."

Sotheby's did not reveal identity of the seller or the buyer, who bid through telephone. The draft, who was in the possession of Springsteen's former manager Mike Appel, is the rough version of the released song. Most of the lines in the draft were unpublished and unrecorded but it still included "a nearly perfected chorus," Sotheby's said.

"Born to Run", which appeared on Springsteen's 1975 album of the same name, has become an American anthem, popularizing the term "Tramps" within generations of fans. Written in Long Branch, New Jersey, it took "The Boss" six months to complete the song.

Also sold on the Thursday, December 5 auction were a series of love letters from Mick Jagger, a letter from John Lennon and works of William Shakespeare, Ernest Hemingway and Thomas Jefferson.